


Baby Don't Hurt Me

by missingnolovefic



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Bittersweet, Campaign 2 (Critical Role), F/M, Fjord/Avantika (mentioned), Fluff, Gen, Pining, Unrequited Crush, the mighty nein - Freeform, what is love?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-03
Updated: 2019-01-03
Packaged: 2019-09-28 11:04:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,020
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17181767
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/missingnolovefic/pseuds/missingnolovefic
Summary: Jester has a question. Caleb is always willing to help her figure things out, even when it hurts.





	Baby Don't Hurt Me

**Author's Note:**

  * For [LunarLover12](https://archiveofourown.org/users/LunarLover12/gifts).



> Luna's been on a Widojest bender and I have to admit, I'm intrigued :D
> 
>  
> 
> The ending's not necessarily happy as much as it's left open, head's up.

Jester dropped down next to Caleb on the riverbank. The water rushed by in torrents, spraying them as it crashed into rocks. Caleb was scribbling something into a notebook, a scroll rolled open and weighed down by two stones next to him. Jester picked a flower, small like a daisy but an orange gold colour. She twirled it around, making the colours blur together.

Caleb watched her from the corner of his eyes, quill slowing down as she plucked the petals one by one, then threw them into the air. Jester closed her eyes as they danced down around her, before being caught by the wind and carried away.

“Hey, Caleb?”

“Ja?” The wizard hastily returned his attention to his book, flipping through his notes.

“How do you know you’re really in love?”

Caleb froze. Slowly, he lifted his gaze from the book, staring straight ahead. The river kept moving, steady and predictable. He darted a glance at Jester.

“How do you mean?”

“Like, I don’t know,” Jester started, picking up a stone and turning it over in her hand. “It’s supposed to be all, like, butterflies in your tummy and a lot of blushing, right?”

“In the books, usually, ja,” Caleb returned, wiping the quill off on his coat.

“Well, you’ve been in love before,” Jester continued determined. “What was it like?”

“It was…” Caleb trailed off, remembering Astrid. And with it their feverish eagerness to prove themselves to Trent, to prove themselves worthy. He shook his head. “It’s hard to describe. What do _you_ feel?”

“I don’t know,” Jester huffed, pulling her knees up to her chest and dropping her arms and head on top. “It’s… That’s what I’m trying to figure out, you know?”

“Well,” Caleb said slowly, trying to buy himself time to think. They had to be talking about Fjord. “You love your mother, right?”

Jester puffed up, offended. “Of course I do!”

“Well, is it like that, what you feel?”

“Hm, I don’t know, Caleb,” Jester hummed doubtfully. “I mean, he’s not the one who raised me, you know?”

“Right.” Caleb sighed, his suspicions confirmed. They were talking about Fjord. “Do you want to kiss him?”

“Maybe?” Jester’s tail flicked back and forth, agitated - like a cat, Caleb mused. “I… I thought so? But now I’m not sure?”

Caleb hummed. “And why is that?” he prodded her gently.

“Well, we kinda did, but it wasn’t a kiss, not really?” She curled her tail around a stone and threw it into the water, where it promptly vanished under the surface. “Not for the right reasons, anyway.”

Caleb flushed, remembering when she had kissed him. She hadn’t looked like herself, disguised as a human girl, and it was just to avoid suspicion, but… Her lips had been soft, warm, and the touch still lingered in his mind.

He doubted he could ever forget.

“Is it on your mind often?” he ventured, carefully pushing the memory to the back of his mind. They were talking about Jester’s crush, not his.

“Hmm. Sometimes? I guess?”

Caleb was taken aback. That didn’t sound as serious a crush as he’d assumed. Jester had been flirting with and chasing Fjord since day one, but… Caleb couldn’t help but wonder. Jester grew up sheltered in the weirdest ways, for a daughter of a lady of the night.

“I guess I’ve kinda been… projecting? What I wanted? Onto him,” Jester continued, tossing the stone in her hand into the air and catching it. “Like, I don’t know, I’ve read all these novels, and I’m like the heroine, you know? And the heroine is supposed to fall in love, right? But the other person is supposed to, like, return those feelings and, I don’t know, but I don’t think Fjord sees me that way?”

She fumbled, and the stone tumbled from her fingers and rolled down the riverbank, only to be swallowed by a crashing wave. Jester huffed and turned to Caleb expectantly.

“Well, I don’t know if Fjord sees anyone that way,” he mused, remembering Avantika. “His attention has been… focussed elsewhere.”

Jester hummed thoughtfully, tail dragging through wet earth, drawing vague shapes. Caleb peered over her shoulder curiously, but didn’t ask.

“So I’ve been thinking-”

“Dangerous,” Caleb joked, and Jester cracked a smile.

“I’ve been thinking, like, I don’t really know what love feels like. But you do, right?” Jester turned to face him, and Caleb stilled under her regard. “You’ve felt it before, Caleb. So. What is love?”

Caleb dropped his gaze staring at his hands. A flick of his wrist, and he cradled a sacred flame in his palm.

“Love is like fire,” he murmured, the flame throwing his face in stark contrast. “It’s warm and beautiful and tempting. It’s… passion and life. It hurts-” Caleb passed the fingers of his free hand through the flickering flame. “-to get close. It burns you up inside out, changes you-”

Caleb lifted his head and pinned Jester with a gaze, fire dancing in his eyes.

“But you can’t look away,” he finished hoarsely. Jester scrunched up her nose.

“That sounds horrible, Caleb.”

“It is.” His lips ticked up into a slight curve. “But when you’re in love… You wouldn’t have it any other way.”

Jester turned her head, staring pensively out at the river. Her blue locks fell to frame her face, and Caleb fought the urge to brush them behind her ear, but he refrained, turning his gaze onto the endless blue water instead.

They sat in silence for a long moment.

“Alright!” Jester jumped up, a big smile on her face. “I think I know what to do!”

“Ja?”

Caleb couldn’t help but return her smile. Jester bent down and planted a kiss on Caleb’s cheek.

“Thanks, Caleb. That helped, I think.”

And with that she skipped up the hill and out of view. Caleb raised a hand to his burning cheek, fingers hovering above where her lips touched his skin, staring after her for a long, long while.

His heart ached, full to bursting. But this wasn’t about his crush.

He turned back to his notes, determined to forget.

  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> Thank you, Luna, for all your support <3 Without you, this story wouldn't exist.


End file.
